


In The Doghouse (The Blue Moon Remix)

by KelpietheThundergod



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: s11e15 Beyond the Mat, M/M, episode coda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-08
Updated: 2016-09-08
Packaged: 2018-08-13 21:16:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7986493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KelpietheThundergod/pseuds/KelpietheThundergod
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean flinches and curses under his breath when Crowley appears in the shotgun seat. His hand curls into a fist and he lets it sink onto the steering wheel slowly, presses his eyes closed.<br/>“The hell are you doing here?” His voice is even rougher than usual, like smoke in icy air.<br/>Crowley looks around and frowns. He knows, but pretends to himself he doesn't.<br/>The real question is, why is Dean sitting in his dark car outside the torture dungeon he calls home in the middle of the night?</p>
            </blockquote>





	In The Doghouse (The Blue Moon Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [memberoftheangelgarrison](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=memberoftheangelgarrison).



> Birthday gift for my dear friend [Nina](http://memberoftheangelgarrison.tumblr.com/) :)
> 
> This work is a remix of my one-shot [In The Doghouse](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6112330) (well, kind of. It departs halfway through the events there and then goes a different route. It's not necessary to read the original first, though I'd recommend it).

 

 

_creatures of the night, they keep_

_our neon lights in shackles_

 

_but still, we hold our heads up high_

 

 

 

 

 

“You're nothing but Dean Winchester's number-one fan.”

He doesn't protest. The words are meant to cut deep and sweet, like a knife slipped through the ribs to pierce vulnerable flesh. It's his last move, to not grant the devil a stammer of breath or a gasp of shameful pain.

He bends with the onslaught, lets himself be hauled over the table. Parchment is squashed under his back, undoubtedly getting stains of dust on the suit that he's just put on. The bloody serpent is still advancing on him, hissing with spiteful anger. He makes himself scarce fast.

Really, what he needs is a drink.

A good Scotch.

Alcohol makes him think of breath drowned in Maker's Mark, of frilly cocktails with tiny umbrellas. So it's really not his fault that he proves the devil right.

>  
  
Dean flinches and curses under his breath when Crowley appears in the shotgun seat. His hand curls into a fist and he lets it sink onto the steering wheel slowly, presses his eyes closed.

“The hell are you doing here?” His voice is even rougher than usual, like smoke in icy air.

Crowley looks around and frowns. He knows, but pretends to himself he doesn't.

The real question is, why is Dean sitting in his dark car outside the torture dungeon he calls home in the middle of the night?

“Could ask you the same thing. What is this? If you wanna sneak away from home I'd recommend actually starting the car. Or did your overbearing brother sack the keys?”

Dean rolls his eyes and blows out an explosive breath.

“What do you _want_?”

And isn't that the sixty-two million dollar question.

Crowley brushes dust off his sleeve that might or might not be there.

“I can't check in once in a while?”

Dean makes an irritated noise and opens the door on his side.

“Fine! I just escaped the questionable hospitality of the devil himself after having been kept in a dank _hole_ as his _pet_ for days on end. So yes, I am feeling _fantastic_ , thank you for your concern.”

Halfway out the car already, Dean pauses. He frowns at Crowley, then slams the door shut again, sinks back into his seat. He smells like tequila and rain, but doesn't appear drunk at all.

“Lucifer had you? This whole time?”

Crowley shrugs, looks out the windshield into the night.

“He's a petty little worm who can hold onto a grudge like no one's business.”

Dean is silent for a long moment, almost audibly tense. His words, when they come, are quiet and brittle.

“He still in Cas?”

Ah. So he knows.

That must have been quite the punch to the gut.

“Unfortunately. Somehow it only makes the pompous ass _more_ obnoxious. I wonder—”

“Shut up.”

Dean is bracing himself on the steering wheel, as if trying to bear a weight too heavy to carry. He presses his knuckles into his eyes and then hisses in pain. Crowley snaps his fingers and the lights inside the car flicker to life, making Dean flinch again and grumble half-heartedly. He's pale under the artificial lighting and the skin around his left cheekbone is darkly bruised.

“Who worked you over?”

“None of your fucking business.”

Crowley rolls his eyes. Yes, this conversation is just _riveting_.

Dean sighs, rubs at his forehead. The fabric of his jacket whispers with the movement.

“Gunner Lawless.”

Crowley lifts an eyebrow at him, a silent and mocking _and that's all that happened_?

As expected, Dean instantly becomes defensive. “It wasn't—” He cuts himself off, blinks rapidly, eyes fixed on the dashboard. With the turn of his head, there's a glint on his cheeks like smudged tear tracks.

Oh.

“He's dead,” Dean says, in a tone that spells out for him how much he does not wish to talk about how that's making him feel.

“Condolences,” Crowley murmurs. Does he mean it? Probably a bad sign if he does.

Dean drags in a deep breath, rubs a hand down his face and leans back in his seat again.

“Hellhounds,” he rasps out.

It makes Crowley lose his train of thought momentarily. Where did that just come from?

“Come again?”

Dean sounds like he's gritting his teeth, a look on his face like he doesn't quite know himself why he's spilling his guts like this.

“His deal was put on hold as long as he collected souls for the guy holding his contract.”

Crowley narrows his eyes. With the light on inside the car, the dark outside now looks impenetrable, like one solid block of black they are both stuck in. He swears under his breath at what Dean's just told him. “Bloody hell.” Crossroad demons are meant to be ambitious, but _this_? Stealing souls? How _dare_ whatever ungrateful piece of—

“Well, the demon's also dead, so there's that.”

Dean is rubbing at his eyes with jerky movements, as if trying to banish the haunted look out of them by force. Even when his soul was drowned in black and he couldn't care less about anything, he had hated the hounds of Hell.

Unsurprising maybe, given his history.

It's a shame he never quite got to understand what _that guy—_ Dean as a demon—was even about. What he wanted. What Crowley could have done to make him stay.

He still tells himself letting him go was for the good of the Kingdom, and not for the good of Dean.

“Anyway, you still haven't answered my question. What're you doing here?”

Right.

What _is_ he doing here?

“Had some time to kill,” he hedges.

Dean doesn't dignify that with a reply.

Crowley sighs. “Fine. I've got nowhere else to go. Happy now?” He doesn't try to hide the bitterness he feels. And screw Dean _very much_ for making him say this.

Dean shifts, and there's the soft sound of the fabric of his jeans sliding against the smooth leather. His body warmth is filling the space between them.

It's been so long since he has felt warmth of any kind.

“Really not in the mood to talk about Hell,” Dean grouses. “But—” He doesn't finish, ending on a higher note, like a question.

Crowley isn't in the mood either, not for this. But getting it out might be therapeutic. That's what they say, right?

It's not like he hasn't already suffered the greatest of possible humiliation in front of his entire court.

“Hell hates me,” he admits.

Dean snorts. “Lucifer say that?”

Crowley bristles a bit. It'd be one thing if it were only that slimy snake saying those things.

“No. They all do.”

_Every demon in Hell..._

He keeps staring out the windshield at the blackness, but in the corner of his vision Dean turns more fully toward him, one leg dragged up halfway onto the bench seat, one arm on the backrest. It's a very open, vulnerable position for Dean to put himself in.

He had better not look, to preserve what's left of his sanity.

“Demons are dickbags filled with nothing but hate. Since when does their perception of you define who you are? You're smarter than this, come on!”

Dean's eyes are still red-rimmed and glassy, but that familiar intensity is back in them. Crowley wills himself to ignore what he feels, barrels over it with anger.

“Maybe I'd have an easier time letting go if I hadn't been kept on a _leash_ and broken in like a misbehaving _dog_!” He hisses acidly.

Dean swallows, his facade cracking for a brief moment. Crowley eyes him suspiciously. Which word had made him react? Leash?

Well. He can imagine why that one would give him pause. Him trying to use Dean as an attack dog didn't come out of nowhere after all.

This. This is why it's safer to collect souls and not hearts, as tacky as that sounds. He will never understand what goes on in Dean's head that he keeps throwing his love out there when he barely ever receives any in return.

Dean rubs at his forehead, effectively shielding most of his expression from view. He sounds like he's barely keeping himself from yelling. Mostly though, he sounds exhausted.

“Look, what do you want from me? I can't help you with Hell. You gotta decide yourself what you wanna do about it. And we can't do anything about Lucifer as long as he's in Cas—” Dean falters for a moment, corners of his mouth turning down in a clear expression of pain.

Oh _god_. Not _that_ on top of literally everything else.

“—and anyway, I'm the last person I'd go to for advice, unless it's about chopping some ugly's head off.”

Typical of him to undermine himself like that. Dean might have done it reluctantly and impatiently, but he did listen to him.

Crowley tugs the cuffs of his suits straighter. He feels more like himself again. Which is—odd; he certainly should feel the least like himself considering where he is right now. But then again, there is no one that gets to decide that but he himself.

“No need to get all worked up, Squirrel. As much as I've enjoyed our little tête-à-tête, I do have to find a way to take back what is mine.”

When Dean remains silent, Crowley looks up. _Damn_ the fact that it is night and Dean is smelling so deliciously of booze and leather. It is giving him unattainable ideas.

Dean is watching him through narrowed eyes. “Don't do anything stupid. And remember, it ain't just Lucifer, it's Cas in there as well.”

Bloody _Christ_ , of course he had to bring that up again now.

Crowley glares at Dean for reasons he dares not examine too closely. He could confront Dean with how Castiel had to have said Yes in order for it to work, throw it in his face. But what for? He would only antagonize Dean, hurt him. It's been a long time since that was fun for him.

“About that,” he says at length. “How are _you_ holding up in the face of—well, everything.”

Dean throws him a funny look, obviously taken aback. “You're worried. About _me_.” He says it like obviously that can't be true.

Before Crowley can think of a sarcastic enough answer, Dean, to his surprise, leans back in his seat and closes his eyes for a moment, his jaw tense.

“Well, I'm not. Holding up all that great. But there's too much at stake, I can't just stop fighting now.” He shrugs, his tone determined even though the set of his shoulders and the vulnerable look in his eyes spells out his exhaustion, his doubts. “So I won't.”

They're both silent for a long, stretched out moment, but it's not an uncomfortable silence. They didn't exactly reach any significant conclusions. No vital information was given or received. Nothing about their current situations has been changed to the better by their conversation. And yet, Crowley feels—invigorated, somehow.

Maybe it's just being inside this car. Time always seems to go by slower in here. There's this certain calming atmosphere to it.

Or maybe that's just Dean.

He doubts Dean will come away feeling better after this. But at least, he kept Dean from continuing to sit in the dark and mourn another loss.

“Anyway, if we're done here, I'd like to get some sleep.”

He's turned away and opened the door already when Crowley blurts out, “You're aware it's not your fault, right?”

Great. When did he make the conscious decision to say _that_?

Dean turns back but doesn't close the door. His expression is a blend of confused and suspicious.

Obviously it's too late to back out, so Crowley barrels ahead. Hope is a fickle bitch, but maybe at some point in the future it will mean something that he told Dean this.

“The Darkness getting out. I imagine it's the last thing you wanted to happen. It's not your fault the decision was taken out of your hands.”

Dean looks away, licks his lips. A muscle ticks in his jaw. “Yeah, _right_ ,” he says, his tone dripping with sarcasm and self-loathing alike.

Well. That battle is obviously not going to be won tonight.

Dean slams his door closed, tells the darkness behind the windshield, “Now get outta my car, I wanna drive her into the garage.”

“You have a garage down there? Of course you have a garage down there.” He sighs. He really should have taken the time to explore the place more thoroughly last time. It's just not easy with the bloody devil's traps all over the place.

“Crowley!”

He rolls his eyes. Says, before he can second-guess himself, “Of course, chérie. I've missed you too.” Then he snaps his fingers and reappears outside the car but well hidden in the shadows.

It's all about that grand exit of course. And not that he is feeling slightly off-kilter from his own words, or that the masochistic part of him wants to watch Dean drive away.

The headlights are bright and red in the dark, the engine a soothing roar in the sudden, deafening silence.

Then Dean is gone.

>

Crowley doesn't linger long, after.

He wasn't lying, there is a lot he needs to do. He'll need to hide, for now. Hatch a plan.

Maybe he has nowhere to go. But, for now, he still has one place to return to.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Edit and poetry at the beginning are mine.
> 
> "Blue Moon" is a type of so-called "blue roses" (bred by conventional hybridization methods, since blue roses do not exist in nature).
> 
> From [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_rose) : "In some cultures, blue roses are traditionally associated with "blue" royal blood, and thus the blue rose can also denote regal majesty and splendor. Due to the absence in nature of blue roses they have come to symbolise mystery and longing to attain the impossible, with some cultures going so far as to say that the holder of a blue rose will have his wishes granted."
> 
> From [roseforlove dot com](http://www.roseforlove.com/the-meanings-of-blue-roses-ezp-39) : "An appreciation for the enigmatic, the inexplicable is expressed by blue roses. A tantalizing vision that cannot be totally pinned down, a mystery that cannot be fully unraveled is the blue rose. A person who receives the blue rose is the subject of much speculation and thought. A complex personality that does not allow easy interpretation is what the blue rose indicates.
> 
> "Another meaning of the blue rose is that it symbolizes the impossible, or the unattainable. Since the blue rose itself is a rarity in nature, it stands for something that is hardly within one's grasp, an object that seems too difficult to be achieved. Thus the blue rose is admired and revered as an unrealizable dream. [...] the fact that the blue rose is a flower that has been fabricated increases this sense of surrealism. The meaning of the blue rose in this sense is an appreciation for something that cannot be grasped in full measure."


End file.
